finest armies of our condottieri in time past, when
they had once got them between steep precipices. I tell you,
Florentines need be afraid of no army in their own streets."

"That's true, Ser Cioni," said a man whose arms and hands were
discoloured by crimson dye, which looked like blood-stains, and who had
a small hatchet stuck in his belt; "and those French cavaliers, who came
in squaring themselves in their smart doublets the other day, saw a
sample of the dinner we could serve up for them. I was carrying my
cloth in Ognissanti, when I saw my fine Messeri going by, looking round
as if they thought the houses of the Vespucci and the Agli a poor pick
of lodgings for them, and eyeing us Florentines, like top-knotted cocks
as they are, as if they pitied us because we didn't know how to strut.
`Yes, my fine _Galli_,' says I, `stick out your stomachs; I've got a
meat-axe in my belt that will go inside you all the easier;' when
presently the old cow lowed, [Note 1] and I knew something had
happened--no matter what. So I threw my cloth in at the first doorway,
and took hold of my meat-axe and ran after my fine cavaliers towards the
Vigna Nuova. And, `What is it, Guccio?' said I, when he came up with
me. `I think it's the Medici coming back,' said Guccio. _Bembe_! I
expected so! And up we reared a barricade, and the Frenchmen looked
behind and saw themselves in a trap; and up comes a good swarm of our
_Ciompi_ [Note 2] and one of them with a big scythe he had in his hand
mowed off one of the fine cavalier's feathers:--it's true! And the
lasses peppered a few stones down to frighten them. However, Piero de'
Medici wasn't come after all; and it was a pity; for we'd have left him
neither legs nor wings to go away with again."

"Well spoken, Oddo," said a young butcher, with his knife at his belt;
"and it's my belief Piero will be a good while before he wants to come
back, for he looked as frightened as a hunted chicken, when we hustled
and pelted him in the piazza. He's a coward, else he might have made a
better stand when he'd got his horsemen. But we'll swallow no Medici
any more, whatever else the French king wants to make us swallow."

"But I like not those French cannon they talk of," said Goro, none the
less fat for two years' additional grievances. "San Giovanni defend us!
If Messer Domeneddio means so well by us as your Frate says he does,
Ser Cioni, why shouldn't he have sent the French another way to Na